


Under the Stars and On Top a Hovercycle

by Wadamwoltron



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Date Night, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Pre Kerberos, Shadam, Stargazing, adashi, first time jumping off a cliff on a bike
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-10
Updated: 2020-01-10
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:48:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,222
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22202110
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wadamwoltron/pseuds/Wadamwoltron
Summary: A little suggestion from Tumblr. Shiro and Adam sneak out to go stargaze overnight, and on the way Shiro dares to attempt diving off a cliff on his hovercycle for the first time with Adam.
Relationships: Adam/Shiro (Voltron)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 16





	Under the Stars and On Top a Hovercycle

“Did you remember your external battery?” Adam yelled from over Shiro’s shoulder. However, the roar of the hot engine beneath them seemed to swallow his voice, as Shiro made no indication that he had heard the question. Adam held tighter to his boyfriend’s waist and pressed his forehead to Shiro’s nape, trying his best to shield his already-shielded eyes from the flurry of sand that the bike kicked up as they blazed across the ground. He’d ask later when they had stopped, his fear of not being able to set an alarm on a dead phone and missing class the following morning a continuously prodding spear at the back of his mind. 

The sun cast a path in front of them, untrodden and unexplored as the two tread through the desert to an unknown destination. Adam sometimes felt Shiro’s recklesness and impulsivity to be a hindrance, but he had to admit after the first night he woke up in his love’s arms beneath the crisp morning dawn, he could let this tendency slide. Cocking his head to look behind them, a grin crept onto Adam’s face as the Garrison wilted into the horizon. It was refreshing to get away once in a while, and with all the stress of classes and homework, it was really expected of one in order to stay sane here. Though sane may not have been the most appropriate word for Shiro’s driving. 

The young pilot needn’t perform any tricks to avoid obstacles out here, as the desert seemed to be shaven of all but the dry land and loose shrubs, too short to be a bother. And yet Adam couldn’t get lost in his thoughts for long, as Shiro often unpredictably jerked the hovercycle in new directions just for the thrill of it. Such of these times occurred as Adam was still gazing back, and he scrambled to dig his fingers into the layers of Shiro’s motor jacket to keep hold as they swung wide, a plume of dust erupting behind them.

Feeling Adam’s struggle, Shiro slowed down the bike to assess him.

“Oh shoot, are you okay Ads?” he turned tenderly, keeping one hand on the bike steady as the other raised up near his shoulder, palm open to take Adam’s hand. The latter accepted, and took comfort in Shiro’s firm grip holding tight to him.

“Yeah, just warn me first. One day you’ll end up sending me off the back of this thing, and you’re gonna be the one to explain to Administration why I’ll have a broken arm.” He prodded Shiro’s spine with an accusatory finger, but the latter didn’t seem to notice. Adam, other hand still in his boyfriend’s own, squeezed his fingers in question.

“Did you hear me?” Adam asked. But Shiro released his hand, eyes locked ahead at something in the near distance. “What is it?” Adam inquired, leaning to the side to see,

“I’m warning you now.” Adam could tell in the timbre of Shiro’s voice that he was smiling. 

“Of what?” Focusing in the distance seemed futile. It had been a while since Adam had his eyes checked, and recently his glasses seemed to have been failing him, objects in the distance becoming muddled moreso than before. 

“I think it should be a surprise. Do you trust me?” Shiro reached a hand back to drag Adam’s wrist around his waist, coaxing him to hold tight once more. Hearing the words alone, Adam would have been inclined to say no, but the way those warm fingers interlocked with his own, the delicate manner with which Shiro gently tugged at Adam’s pant leg to ask for him to shift in closer, his heart pulled the other direction. Shiro was dumb and ambitious and reckless, but the adventurer in him did not outweigh the rationalist, and Adam knew Shiro would never do anything to jeopardize their safety. 

“Yes.”

Holding as tightly as he could while still considering Shiro’s ability to breathe, Adam hunkered down close and awaited the unknown. It wasn’t that he didn’t enjoy thrills, much more that he was unaccustomed to them, his family rather boring in their vacation and amusement activities. It was all he could do as a kid to convince his parents they needed a Slip-N’-Slide. The Garrison had certainly warmed him to the twists and turns of piloting, but near the beginning Adam found it difficult to make it through the day after any sort of flight training, the intensiveness of a ship traveling so fast and turning so hard a massive toll on both his stomach and his energy. It was only after Shiro had helped him gain better control during class that Adam began to barely appreciate the sensation, and now more than a year and a half later, he still much preferred the comparatively small thrills that traveling on a hovercycle could bring. He very much could pilot, but it seemed the residue of his initial interactions with it made him less enticed by thrills than his love. That, and the inherent danger the training brought with it. However, Shiro had insisted they take the hovercycle today, welcome and tame by comparison, just enough for Adam to still find it enjoyable. 

So as the horizon crawled closer with intensifying speed, and the sheer dropoff came into view, Adam flashed a grin. The bike rumbled with the increasingly rigid landscape as they drew closer to the edge, sending his heartbeat into his ears. At first it appeared as though the drop was no more than a divet in the sand, no more than a person tall. It would be a fun little bunny hill in comparison to the fighter jets, and Adam remained content in that expectation. But as his eyesight adjusted and the wind carried a cloud of dust away to clear his vision, he came to realize that the cliff was exactly that: a massive crack in the land, a plateau dropping down what seemed to be dozens of feet. Adam’s breath hitched as Shiro revved the engine, sending them soaring at improbable speeds towards their fate. 

“Oh GOD- Takashi!!! I change my mind, I change my mind, I CHANGE MY MIND, ICHANGEMYMIND-” the screams exploded from his throat as the ground disappeared beneath them, a sense of almost tranquility blanketing the moment of suspension before gravity began their descent. 

“TAKASHI YOU DUMBAAAAAAAAAAA-” he cried out into the wind. The word faded into a barrage of screams that felt as though his throat was being pulled apart, intermingled with Shiro’s hollers of delight. The bike raced to the ground with terrifying speed, and Adam exhausted his brain in mere moments wondering why Shiro hadn’t tried to pull up yet. The cliff teased them with probable blunt-force trauma as the rocks at the bottom drew nearer with each passing millisecond. Adam shut his eyes as he began to reflect on his foolishness in assuming Takashi Shirogane would settle for small thrills. All he could do was hold tight to Shiro, his last source of comfort. And just as he half-expected to feel Shiro’s skull ejected from his head, a dramatic sinking feeling dragged Adam’s stomach back down from his throat, and gravity seemed to turn. 

The sensation was nauseating, but Adam was grateful to feel any sensation at all, as he was sure they’d both be unconscious and bleeding out by now. Forcing one of his eyes to open against the wind, Adam peeked out to see that Shiro had turned the hoverbike up at the last second, the cliff at their backs as they rode, still breathing - more alive than ever - into the now setting sun. Shiro let off the gas and the bike slowly began coasting to a stop. His torso heaved against Adam’s temple, the smile seeping in through every inch of his body language. Adam’s own felt the opposite as the adrenaline surged through him in discomfort, his muscles giving way to trembling as they slowed to a stop. Shiro turned to grin at his boyfriend, but his warm demeanor dropped instantly when he saw Adam’s face.

“Hey- oh no, Adam, are you okay? Are you hurt?” He cast himself off the bike to turn and face his love, reaching out tentatively as if scanning for injuries with his palms, questions pouring from his lips. “That was too much wasn’t it? Here, do you need help down? What can I do for you? Oh- kuso-” Shiro cursed out his own selfish foolishness as he scooped Adam into his arms. The latter’s muscles were too distracted from the shaking to protest any, not that he would have in the first place, and he slid gently into his boyfriend’s chest, the sudden comfort of being carried so effortlessly a brake to his accelerated breathing. 

“I’m-… I’m okay Takashi. That was just…” he paused as the full weight of what they had just done seemed to force the panic from his chest and replace it with frustration. “That was just INSANE! What were you thinking, Takashi, I had no idea you were going to do that!” He attempted to shove himself from Shiro’s arms, the latter releasing him after a quick struggle to worm out of his grasp. 

“I can’t believe you, you’re way too reckless!” The anger roused some unexpected tears in his eyes, the way anger sometimes did. All of the previous thrill in Shiro’s face had been purged as he looked with care and regret. “What if you got hurt?”

“I’m so sorry, I knew it would be fine– we’ve been trained in bail-outs, you know? We both have experience. I just thought it would be fun to-”

“To what? Risk our lives? For some sort of adrenaline-junkie trip?” 

“No! I thought it would be fun to share something new with you!” He nearly yelled the words. Adam looked appalled to hear them. After a pause, Shiro caught his breath and continued tentatively. “I found this cliff when I was riding around one day last month. I knew it was going to be safe and okay, we had both done bail-outs in ships– real ones! I thought this would be way more tame than that, just the right amount of excitement…. that it would be okay. I wanted to share with you things that we both can enjoy.” He turned, ashamed to have such a foolish wish. 

Adam softened a little at the words. Shiro was right, after all. They had both not missed a single mark this year in either the simulations or out in the field when it came to extreme maneuvers like that. Though both still only 16, they had stood out as being remarkably proficient in the area, though it still bothered Adam to a certain degree to engage in it. But Shiro’s security in his ability was not to be doubted. Adam merely hadn’t expected for such a stunt to occur, didn’t have time to prepare for it mentally, and suffered afterwards as a result. He sighed, and stepped over a shrub to reach a hand onto Shiro’s shoulder.

“You’re right. We both knew how to do this safely. I just didn’t know it was coming. In that moment I had forgotten everything else. I got really scared, Takashi. I’m sorry.” Shiro’s eyes widened at the response, and not a moment later his arms had encased Adam in a hug, safe and warm and quiet. 

“Don’t apologize. You were right to be scared. I didn’t know you hadn’t realized I was going to do that. It’s my fault for not telling you properly.”

“I shouldn’t have yelled at you.” 

“Hey, it’s okay. You were scared, and it was my fault.”

“You just wanted to have fun, I overreacted.”

“No, you didn’t. You just reacted. I shouldn’t have done that.” Shiro pulled back from the hug a little to catch his thumb under Adam’s chin, tilting his head upwards to meet his eyes. “Adam, I’m sorry.” Adam’s eyes glinted a little, a flicker of some emotion Shiro couldn’t in that moment identify, but he smiled softly, the glow of the setting sun dancing against his face. 

“I’m sorry too. I’d like to try that with you again someday… just as long as you tell me EXACTLY what you’re going to do first, you idiot!” With that, he gently beat his fists against Shiro’s already bulky chest, a futile attempt to playfully retaliate. Shiro laughed and responded by flicking his thumb up just a little more against Adam’s chin, angling him just right to softly press their lips together. The two didn’t move for a few moments, the source of their accelerated heart beats shifting. When they pulled away from one another, it was lingering and flustered. Adam quickly turned himself back towards the bike, making his way to the tail of it to access the airtight compartment where their supplies had been stored. 

“Let’s get back on track and have a nice night out here, that is, if we still have any supplies left after you hurled us over a cliff.” It had a little bite of animosity to it still, but Adam’s tone was more overwhelmingly snide rather than angry. He shot a teasing facial expression, tongue out and all, at Shiro before clicking the compartment open. Despite the contents being completely in disarray from the unique form of travel, everything appeared present and intact. 

“Help me set up for the night, Takashi,” Adam asked. He was smiling this time. 

________________________________________________________________

“Polaris! I found it first!” Shiro exclaimed, reaching his arm for the sky. Adam squinted hard, then fiddled without looking down for the handheld telescope by his side. He drew it up to his eye, found it was near impossible to see through with his glasses, and paused to prop them up on his forehead before trying again. Of course, he should have known it would be even less efficient without the aid of the lenses, and surrendered the telescope to Shiro to inspect further. 

“Fine, I trust you,” Adam sighed. “I was looking so hard too.” 

Dusk had rested her shawl over the chilled earth, the afterglow of the evening still just barely peeking around the edges of the sky. With the sun gone and their empty dinner plates resting by their sides, the two had taken up to studying the cosmos for the first of the stars to appear. They had set up camp a little further from where the bike had stopped around an hour before, hunting for an area less inhabited by rocks that had broken off the cliff and scattered by time throughout the area. The location they had found was flat and relatively barren, its face open to the night sky and its sands heavy and solid against the light breeze of the evening. The perfect location for stargazing. 

Shiro scanned around looking for the next star to appear, catching a line of several in a row that formed Orion’s belt. Muttering the constellation’s name, Shiro help the telescope back out for Adam, who tried once again to bring the eyepiece close enough to his eye to register the blurry magnified image within it. It became just clear enough to detect the several fuzzy dots that twinkled against the dark backdrop, and Adam nodded in confirmation. He laid the scope to the side of their little setup, so that he might reach it still but not roll over it in case they passed out before he remembered to put it away. Reclining back, Adam joined Shiro on the sleeping bags, pulling the hoodie of his wool sweater over his ears on his way down to shut out the wind. 

“You cold?” Shiro inquired.

“A little, the forecast didn’t say there’d be a breeze tonight.”

“Here, come under the blankets with me.” Shiro scooted a little out of the sleeping bag that enveloped his legs to better unzip the seam, where they had sewn their two separate bags together to form one large one, decorated with heavy warm blankets for maximum comfort. Adam turned to crawl on his hands and knees briefly to access the opening, and slid inside the layers of comfort, already incredibly warm with Shiro’s own body heat. He sighed into the coziness, adjusting to lay his head down on his pillow and stare at the sky once more. 

“Better?” Shiro teased, nudging himself to lay close to Adam, their arms touching, fingers effortlessly intertwining. 

“Much.” 

It was several minutes before they would speak again. Part of the enjoyment of the night was that they could experience the tranquility together. Though spending their days at the Garrison by each other’s sides was always well and good, there was a certain need to sometimes just exist in the same space, activities excluded. Though everything was made better by the other’s presence, so was nothing. It was enough to simply not be doing anything of importance in order to relax, but doing so with the love of their life by their sides certainly enhanced the experience. And as the last drops of daylight were laid to sleep, Adam broke the silence.

“Takashi, why did you join the Garrison?” Shiro shot a questioning glace at his boyfriend, as though that was a strange question to ask. 

“Isn’t it obvious? I want to be in space. I want to see the stars. Not just from a telescope, but in person. I want to know what’s out there. Whole worlds could exist beyond our comprehension, there’s so much outside of what we know. If I could just chip away a little at that unknown, do something good for people, well then that’s all I could ask for.” He wistfully cast his words to the stars in hopes they’d hear. “I think I just wanted to be a pilot, too,” he snickered. Adam turned to look at him as he spoke, enraptured with the way Shiro’s heart danced in his eyes when he talked about his dreams. He was an open book, unapologetically, and one that contained many empty pages he would come to fill in the future. 

“Why a pilot, then? Why not a scientist or a cartographer?” Adam asked. 

“Well, heh. I dunno…. I guess I do, but it’s a little stupid.” He paused for a moment to gauge Adam’s reaction, but when he found none, Shiro could only continue. “I don’t really remember it, and maybe it’s kind of silly but– when I was a really young kid I was pretty weak. I couldn’t run very fast or far, I couldn’t throw hard or lift heavy things like other kids. And it got me down thinking that there was something wrong with me that was holding me back. But the first time I felt like I could do something just as well as others was - heh- this silly little space ranger game at the Air and Space Museum. My parents took me there for my birthday, all I would talk about was space. It was one of those flight simulator things. And it didn’t rely on strength or physical prowess, it was about skill. Tactics. Attention. It took you through the known galaxy, this giant screen with animations of hyper space and stuff. And I thought it was, like, the coolest thing. I FELT like the coolest thing. And from then on I had my sights set on making that true, I guess.” Shiro turned his face away a little, hiding the obvious embarrassment in talking about such a silly origin.

“I don’t believe you,” Adam replied flatly. 

“What?” Shiro whipped his head around harshly in his confusion, meeting Adam’s eyes side by side on their pillows.

“You? Weak?” he reached to grasp at Shiro’s bicep. “Look at your arms and tell me you’re weak.” There was a sort of joking tone as he gave another squeeze, then let his hand fall in between them as their eyes stayed locked, and Adam’s seemed to turn over as he blinked. For when he opened them again, they were still and determined. “Look at your heart and tell me you’re weak.” Adam had a haunting sternness in his tone, that of someone who felt incredibly strongly. Shiro broke the eye contact first, chuckling in his flustered state. 

“I guess I’m just trying to prove I’m not.” 

Adam shot his hand forward quickly, but its presence on Shiro’s cheek was gentle and tender. He looked into those stormy eyes and only saw sincerity. It pained Adam to learn this, that Shiro felt he had something to prove. In the moment, he was briefly unsure how to react. He assumed it wouldn’t be comforting to beat himself down in attempts to lift Shiro up, to admit his own insecurities in his inability to enjoy flying as much as his boyfriend, or his abrasiveness, or his hindering eyesight, even. But he eventually found the words, and drew himself closer to whisper them onto Shiro’s lips.

“I don’t know how to tell you everything you are. There’s too much to say. And I don’t know how you can’t see it all there, in you.” If the prior events of the day taught Adam one thing, it was that Takashi Shirogane could do anything. Even dive off a cliff without a scratch. Even become the best, most revolutionary pilot the world had ever seen. No amount of weakness could stop Shiro from his dreams. Adam thought that was a good thing at the time. Shiro sighed, and responded by pressing a kiss into Adam’s hair.

“I’m very lucky to have you.”

“You’ll always have me.”

________________________________________________________________

They stayed up for some time longer. With the early September weather, the sun was still setting remarkably late, and by the time it was finally gone from the sky it was only around 9:30 pm. Adam coaxed Shiro to get up and help him put away their mess before they tucked in to sleep. They’d had a heavy lunch knowing they were sneaking out later that evening, a massive spread from a sushi restaurant. As such, there wasn’t too much to clean now, the remaining crumbs on the plates from their peanut butter and jelly sandwiches easy to brush off before the plates were returned to their proper home in the compartment. Adam exchanged them for their massive thermos, which held still-steaming water for hot chocolate. He glided over with two little tin cups in one hand and the thermos in the other, two packets of Swiss Miss in his sweater pocket. 

They sipped their coco in serenity, the warmth soothing them from the increasing chill of the night. Adam tucked his head into the crook of Shiro’s shoulder as they sat, at first saying nothing before getting on to talking about silly arbitrary things. Adam presumed it was time to actually go to sleep when he laughed so hard that he snorted at something as relatively mundane as the fact that someone had apparently released a cat into Iverson’s office that morning. 

“Come on, let’s get to sleep,” he yawned, standing against the briskness as he strode to the compartment once more for his toothbrush and toothpaste. Shiro cared less about going one night without brushing his teeth, but Adam expected such and purchased an extra toothbrush just for this very occasion. As Shiro stood in grumpy acceptance with the brush in his mouth, Adam spit into the now empty thermos to keep from contaminating the environment or fauna with a foreign substance such as toothpaste. Shiro did the same, and they both raced back to the comfort of the sleeping bags, where the frigid air was a little less difficult to survive. 

As they adjusted to get comfortable, their shared heat a much-welcome embrace, they locked eyes once more. Adam leaned into the kiss first this time, exhaling softly at the contact. It felt like the world had stopped turning when he and Shiro were able to sneak in moments like this. It felt suspended, in both time and space, as the desert seemed to dissolve, leaving only the two of them behind. And when they pulled away it was there again. The sky, the world. The Garrison was there. Adam attempted to restrain himself from letting his mind dwell on the fact that he had to return to life tomorrow, and no man nor god had the power to stretch this moment across the rest of time. But he reckoned now was enough. 

Shiro was asleep by the next kiss. It never took him long to pass out, especially in locations he felt safe and comfortable. It was relieving to know Adam was one of those places. He moved a stray hair from his love’s mess of bangs before tracing a tired finger along his jaw. He reflected on the events of the day, how foolish he now felt for acting so aggressively, how it was actually quite thrilling in retrospect to perform such a maneuver with the open wind against his face, rather than the enclosed cockpit of a fighter jet. How Takashi Shirogane could do anything, even get this stubborn abrasive bookworm to fall so deeply in love with him. How this was only temporary, and the world was about to start turning again with the morning. And still, it was enough.


End file.
